


The Profound Bond

by greyghostcat



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Bonding, M/M, Mark of Cain
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-21
Updated: 2015-01-31
Packaged: 2018-03-08 10:48:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3206441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greyghostcat/pseuds/greyghostcat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Removing the Mark of Cain will change Dean's life forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just an idea I had about tonight's mid-season premiere. Which will most likely invalidate everything I have written after it airs!

Metatron laughed gleefully as Sam slammed him back in the chair.

“I’m guessing that’s a no?” he asked, shifting his cramped shoulders to relax the tension against his bound hands.

“No.” Sam echoed shortly. “No deal.”

Metatron faked a moue of disappointment, voice dripping with false confusion when he spoke.

“But Sam…you just told me you’d do anything to save your brother. Was it a lie? ” A steely glint entered his eyes, and his pout turned fierce. 

“I’ve seen firsthand how far his friends are willing to go to save him. Don’t tell me you wouldn’t do the same.”

Sam looked at him for a moment, face impassive. 

“Maybe I just don’t believe you have it.” He turned and walked away.

~

Sam closed the door behind him firmly and looked up into the other’s expectant faces.

“He has it.”

Dean let out a low sigh, and for the first time in weeks his face showed a faint glimmer of hope. Castiel on the other hand looked grimly resigned.

“What did he offer you?” he grated out.

“He wants us to free him of course. Says he’ll take us to the grace after we do. And…” Sam flicked his eyes away then back to the waiting angel.  
“…he wants Cas to come with him as insurance.”

“No deal.” Dean said immediately. “What does he think we are, idiots?” He growled in frustration. “This whole thing stinks worse than a ten dollar whore.”

Castiel laid a hand on his shoulder, stopping him.

“He thinks we are desperate Dean. And he is right.” 

His eyes met Dean’s for a moment. Depression and self-loathing were battling each other in the murky green. It was all the answer Castiel needed, and he straightened, the lines on his forehead easing. “But not wholly without options.”

Castiel moved suddenly, pushing past Sam. Before Sam could think to stop him, the angel had opened the door and disappeared into the darkness inside.

“Wait Cas!” Sam reached after him helplessly.

The whole thing was finished before they even had a chance to react. Dean and Sam cleared the stacks running, just in time to hear Metatron’s startled scream, high-pitched and terrified, cut short in a choking gurgle.

Castiel looked at them from across the room, fierce and resolute. His blood soaked hands were steady where they rested against the scribe’s cooling skin, one hand cupping Metatron’s jaw with a lover’s caress as a thin stream of liquid silver poured from his gaping neck and into a waiting bottle.

“Cas, what the...”

“How did you know?” Dean was matter of fact, his voice betraying no sympathy for the dead man in Cas’ arms.

Castiel stoppered the bottle swiftly and stepped away, leaving Metatron’s head to loll forward limply against his chest.

“It was his most precious possession. A bargaining chip he would have kept close to him.” Castiel shrugged his shoulders and offered up the bottle to the eldest Winchester. “And I guessed.”

Dean eyed the small bottle full of swirling, glowing quicksilver. Angel grace. And not just any angel’s grace- Castiel’s. The life force that he couldn’t live without.

“Cas, why would you give this to me?” Dean asked, refusing to accept the proffered bottle.

“You need it more than I do at the moment,” Castiel answered simply. He held out a hand. “Let me see the Mark.”

Dean searched the angel’s steady blue gaze for a moment, looking for answers and seeing only determination. In this moment it all came down to trust. Cas had trusted him countless times before with his life, was trusting him even now with his very grace. Did he trust Cas enough to do the same?

Dean rolled up his sleeve, revealing the Mark of Cain on his arm, raw and angry red. 

Castiel stepped forward and grasped his forearm tight. As he began to pour, he spoke in a calming, low voice at odds with his firm grip.

“An angel’s grace is more than just the source of his power Dean. It is a blessing from our Father.”

Dean shivered at the first touch of grace on his skin, cold as ice.

“Our Father made us perfect. Holy. Unable to sin, compelled to obey. Beautiful, with no means to appreciate beauty. With no love in our hearts except the love we had for him.”

The cold began to penetrate and sting like needles piercing just under his skin. Dean gasped as the Mark flared in response.

“The Mark of Cain is the antithesis of all these things,” Castiel continued. “It is chaos and violence. Anger. Hatred. Selfish emotion.”

The needles crawled up his arm, burning. Dean’s skin felt charged, like the time when he was eight and had poked his utility knife into the motel room socket. His heart stuttered in his chest.

Castiel pitched his voice even lower, just for Dean’s ears alone. His grip tightened.

“You are not a monster Dean. The Mark is not who you are.” A lingering sadness lurked in the angel’s blue eyes. “And despite my Father’s intentions, the angel he made me is not who I am.”

The brand on Dean’s arm was changing now, its raised edges being eaten away by an older, more powerful force. White-hot fire flared beneath his skin, the red was overtaken by brilliant light, and like that the Mark was gone.

Castiel raised his hand quickly, a slight glow still glimmering in the depths of the bottle.

Something was wrong though. The Mark was gone but Dean was drowning now in holy fire. Being consumed by the grace that saved him.

His arm blazed like a beacon. The angel’s grace was racing through his veins, faster and faster, spreading through his body lightning quick, burning him from the inside out. It was consuming him. 

Pain arched through Dean, unimaginably strong. It was too much.

He screamed.

Darkness reached up and swallowed him.


	2. Chapter 2

Dean looked up from his laptop screen and watched as his brother wandered into the library, a plate of food tucked under one arm and munching on a bagel.

Cinnamon raisin. Dean’s favorite. 

The plate easily held enough for two.

When Sam left the room again, Dean knew it would be conveniently forgotten on a table just within his line of sight, a wordless reminder.

He sighed.

Sam meant well, but his mothering was reaching fucking annoying levels lately.

Ever since the whole incident with the Mark of Cain, his brother had been treating him like a helpless baby; checking in on him while he slept, hovering when he was awake, making sure that he ate three square meals on time each day.

Really, Sam was just making a big deal over nothing. 

So what if Dean spent two weeks lying unconscious in a hospital bed after Cas’ grace had almost killed him. That was over a month ago now, and Dean was fine. 

Still here, still breathing, and still a 36-year-old fully grown up man.

Dean had had enough.

“I was about to go for a poop. Did you want to join me? Make sure I can still wipe my own ass?”

Sam paused his chewing, giving him a startled look. 

He looked torn for a brief second, about to say something sarcastic back before he recovered himself.

“I’m sure you can figure it out Dean,” he replied serenely, cramming another bite into his mouth and turning away.

Dean snorted.

Sam set the plate down with a bang as he exited the room.

Dammit. 

He _really_ needed something to do. If only to keep him from killing the one person who was actually trying to help him in his majorly overbearing, pain-in-the-ass way.

Dean frowned and swiped at the laptop in front of him, disturbing the screensaver he’d been blankly staring at before his brother’s arrival. 

Things had been too quiet lately. No matter how often Dean checked the newspapers he couldn’t find a single article worth investigating, and all his calls to fellow hunters had resulted in a frustrating amount of nothing. 

At this point he really didn’t care what the job was, he just needed an excuse to get out of the bunker and stretch his legs.

He refreshed the local news page on his browser and a new headline appeared.

**Wheat Crop Failures Rise Along With Global Temperatures**

Dean sighed and sat back, scrubbing a frustrated hand over his stubbled cheeks. Something had better turn up soon or he was really going to lose it.

~

_Bang bang bang bang._

All four bullets hit the large paper target inches from each other, shredding neatly through the circle at its center.

Dean held his position for a moment after firing, eyeing the placement of his shots through the pistol’s narrow sights.

“Nice shooting,” Sam commented from behind him, snapping the slide back into place on his freshly cleaned weapon and reaching across a cluttered table for another.

Dean let his shoulders relax back gradually and put the gun down, turning to face his brother.

“Yeah, not too bad,” he said. “The month off hasn’t done me any favors though.”

He glanced down reflexively at his bare right arm. The smooth, unmarked flesh there still seemed strange to his eyes, its restored appearance somehow more alien than the scar.

Dean flexed his fist slowly, watching for a minute as the tendons strained rhythmically.

“It was a lot easier before y’know,” he said suddenly. “My hands just knew what to do.” 

The feel of his skin moving over muscle and bone was soothingly hypnotic, and for a moment his voice turned pensive; lost in memory. 

“When I had the Mark…fighting, it was like breathing to me. Natural. Like my body was finally doing what it was meant to do. Nothing else mattered. In that moment I didn’t have to think, just move.”

Dean closed his eyes and dropped his arm back to his side.

“You wanna know the worst part though Sammy?” He paused, and then half whispered the rest; guilty.

“It felt so good just to let go.”

After a minute when the silence began to stretch, he looked up. 

His brother was watching him steadily from across the table. Sam had put down a half stripped rifle, and was leaning forward on both hands.

“You don’t need the Mark to feel that Dean,” he said seriously. “It might have been easier living like that, with no control and no regrets…but that’s how you know it’s wrong.”

He pinned Dean with his gaze, eyes intent.

“My brother taught me that nothing in life ever comes easy. You have to earn every bit of it. I know this isn’t the life we imagined for ourselves, but it’s the one we made.”

Sam gestured at the room around them.

“Here…in this place. Anytime. You can let it all go, if that’s what you need to do.”

Sam glanced down at the weapons spread out on the table before him and back up to his brother’s face.

“Maybe it’s too soon Dean. We don’t have to do this right now. Wait until you’re feeling stronger.”

Dean blinked and suddenly remembered himself.

What the hell was he doing revealing his guilty innermost thoughts to Sam? Those were the ugly things that he never showed to anyone.

Except maybe to one particular angel...but that guy hadn’t even bothered to show his face in over a month.

And here he was burdening his brother with yet more crap. Sam was already worried about him enough without adding mental instability to the list.

Dean found his smile again.

“Guess it’s a good thing I got you here to take care of me Sammy.” He laid the sarcasm on thick, eager to end the conversation quickly. “Hey, maybe all I needed to feel complete was more egg whites and kale in my diet.”

Sam sighed.

Dean grinned. Mission accomplished.

He was turning back towards the firing range again, when something made him freeze in place, recognition flooding through him instantly. 

Dean spun back around.

“Hey,” He barked at the empty air. “Took you long enough to show your face.”

Castiel appeared in the space where he was glaring with a flutter of wings.

“Hello Dean,” he greeted warmly.

Dean barely registered the odd look Sam was giving him; he was suddenly too pissed off to care.

All the many irritations and frustrations over the last few weeks suddenly boiled over as he took in the pleased expression on the angel’s face.

“Hello? That’s all you got Cas?” He could feel his heartbeat rising, his blood pumping faster, and he clenched both hands reflexively.

“Try, how’ve you been Dean? Still alive after I pumped you full of angel juice last freaking month and left you screaming on the floor?” 

Dean took a challenging step forward, fury making his voice uneven. “Did it ever even occur to you to be worried? Or could you just not be bothered to check?”

Castiel seemed at a loss how to respond to this. His smile faded.

“Yes, well. I did…hear you were recovering fine.”

Dean shot a narrow-eyed glare at his brother.

“You heard,” he repeated flatly. “Funny how I didn’t hear anything about you.”

Sam quickly ducked his head back down to his work, leaving them to sort things out on their own.

“Dean, I asked Sam not to tell you when I contacted him.” Castiel admitted easily, his tone infuriatingly unapologetic.

“I thought it would be best to let you recuperate in peace, without any interference from…me. I did very much want to see you though.”

Dean’s mouth flattened into a hard line.

“I see. Well now you’ve seen me.” He spread both arms wide. “Still alive. Now you can just fuck off back to wherever you’ve been.”

Castiel regarded him sorrowfully for a moment, able to see straight through his bullshit like always to the hurt underneath.

“I am sorry Dean,” he said quietly. “I came here today because there is something I need to talk to you about, however…” He made a soft noise of frustration, “…not like this.”

Castiel shrugged his shoulders helplessly and took a step back. “For now I’ll do as you ask.”

He disappeared again.

Dammit!

Dean swung around and punched blindly at the range wall in front of him. Pain spiked through his hand instantly, knifing through the fog of his anger, and leaving him trembling with only regret. 

He left a bright smear of blood behind on the concrete as he pulled his hand back to his chest. 

The movement made him wince; something was clearly broken.

This day just got better and better.

Behind him Sam cleared his throat. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No.” Dean snapped.

~

Metallica was good for the soul.

Dean relaxed back against the headboard of his bed, headphones blaring loud, willfully ignoring the fact that he currently looked like the poster child for teenage angst.

He just needed some time alone in his head right now. Time to figure out what the hell had happened earlier. 

Things with Castiel had always been complicated, irritatingly so. The angel had a way of getting under Dean’s skin and causing him to say things he later regretted. But today, seeing him had made Dean’s anger spin out of control; his words especially harsh.

The more he sat and thought about it though, his entire morning seemed to have been leading up to that angry outburst. Maybe Cas was just the final straw.

I mean…sure he’d never been stellar at the whole rest and rehabilitation bit, but lately the desire to just get up and leave was like a constant itch beneath his skin.

Almost like his body knew there was somewhere else it should be, and his mind just needed to catch up.

And every day he sat here useless the worse it was getting. In fact the only time he hadn’t felt that unbearable itch lately was when he was yelling at Cas; probably because he was too angry to notice.

That was the other thing worrying him though, the anger. 

Everything and everyone around Dean seemed to be constantly pissing him off, and he honestly didn’t know why.

The intensity of his rage and his hair-trigger temper almost felt like when the Mark of Cain was still active; ramping up all his emotions and rage to a frenzied level in order to slake its need for violence and blood.

Dean shuddered. 

Could it be possible some residual effects were still left over from the Mark? 

Or...even worse, that the Mark had never truly been gone after all; the scar wiped clean but its vicious taint still hiding somewhere deep inside him…

Shit, maybe that’s exactly what Cas had been trying to tell him earlier, right before Dean had yelled at him to get lost.

Dean needed some answers now.

He pulled his headphones off and tossed them aside, careful to avoid jarring his injured hand too much. 

Taking a deep breath, he asked the air around him tentatively.

“Cas, you there?”

Dean waited a tense few minutes for the angel to appear.

Nothing.

“Cas, c’mon man. I really need to talk to you.”

When there was still no answer after a moment, he sighed and swallowed his pride.

“…please.”

The room remained silent. Dean started to get pissed.

“What the hell Cas? I know you can hear me. Get your feathery ass down here.”

Dean gritted his teeth, waiting. Exactly how much groveling was the angel going to make him do before he responded?

For the millionth time, Dean wished he had a personal locator spell tagged to Castiel’s habitual trench coat. It would sure come in handy for times when he needed him like this. 

And just like that, as if the clouds were opening up after a storm, Dean suddenly knew with absolute certainty where the angel was hiding.

Hah. He smiled grimly. Guess I’m coming to you.

~

Dean pulled into the motel parking lot, killing the low rumble of the engine swiftly. 

Sam knew all his Baby’s sounds by heart, and he wanted to enjoy every second of panicked surprise on his brother’s face when he busted both their asses in a minute.

Dean had been driving all night. He’d had plenty of time to think about this moment.

He got out and shut the car door behind him quietly. 

A busted neon sign by the front entrance proclaimed that the motel currently had **NO VA NCY** , and its general disrepair had that classy rent-by-the-hour vibe.

Dean walked a few feet over towards the dimly lit row of cracked beige doors facing the highway. 

He knocked hard on number 11A with his uninjured hand, shaking loose a few flakes of paint from the frame.

There was a minute of silence on the other side, and then the door opened cautiously.

“Dean?” Sam’s face was everything he’d been hoping for, plus a side of wide-eyed guilt. His brother looked completely shocked to see him.

“Hey,” he said simply, pushing his way into the room. 

Now that he was finally here, a large part of the anger he had maintained at a constant simmer during the drive over seemed to disappear.

His searching gaze found Castiel across the room and held.

The angel had risen from his chair when Dean appeared at the door, but unlike Sam, his face showed no surprise. He regarded Dean calmly, eyes expectant.

Ok then.

Dean slowly walked over and sat down in the other chair across from Cas. He stretched out his legs and crossed them at the ankles, taking his time getting comfortable.

“So,” he said after a minute, looking up at the angel and his brother. “It seems to me like you two are keeping secrets, but feel free to prove me wrong.” He smiled at them pleasantly.

Castiel opened his mouth to respond, but Sam stopped him quickly.

“Cas, don’t bother.”

After three decades of living with his brother, Sam knew exactly when it was time to give in. He sighed and immediately came clean.

“We’re working a case here Dean. I would have been back sooner, but there was another murder and the only witness wasn’t easy to track down. Cas has been helping me out with it.”

Dean digested this information slowly, some of his earlier anger sparking back to life.

“I see. So is this is your thing now Sam? Sneaking around behind my back, working cases with _Cas_ while you tell me there’s nothing out there to hunt. Nice.”

“Dean…”

“No, Sam. You don’t get to play the wounded card right now.” Dean sat up, abandoning his relaxed posture.

“I’ve been putting up with all your crap lately; trying to do the right thing, not pushing myself too hard, eating all the weird shit you give me. I didn’t want to make you worry.”

Dean flung a hand out. 

“And now I find out you and Cas have been…” 

“Yeah, just how did you find us?” Sam interrupted.

“...lying to me the whole time," he finished and paused. How could he possibly answer that question when he didn’t even know the answer to it himself?

“I just knew where you’d be.” He hedged, trying to recover his righteous tone. “Anyway, I think I deserve the world’s biggest fucking apology from you both right now.”

Sam wouldn’t let it go so easily though. 

“Hold on a minute Dean. How _did_ you know we were here?” He was beginning to look really worried. “No one else knew, and Cas brought me here himself. It’s not like we left a trail for you to follow.”

“I don’t know Sammy,” Dean sighed. “All I can tell you is I knew where Cas was, and I knew you were with him.” 

Sam frowned. “That’s not exactly reassuring.” He glanced down at Dean’s arm, possibilities multiplying in his head.

“We should get you back to the bunker Dean, there could be something really wrong.”

“You think I don’t know that Sam? That’s what I came to find out,” Dean snapped. They both glared at each other.

Castiel broke the silence quietly. “I believe I may have an explanation.”

Both brothers turned to face him. The angel was suddenly having trouble meeting Dean’s gaze.

“I didn’t think it was possible…” he began. “I’ve never heard of it happening before like this but…”

His eyes finally lifted and met Dean’s, their piercing blue depths impossibly vivid.

“I believe that by sharing my grace with you, we may have formed a bond.”

(To be continued)


End file.
